3rd Defendant Is Sentenced to 25 Years to Life

The third defendant in a gruesome torture-murder case was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison Tuesday for helping two friends burn a man to death in Ventura County’s northern mountains.

But Judge Charles McGrath ruled that Matthew Ormsby, who was 16 when the crime occurred and was not one of the main perpetrators, should be eligible for parole when he is 45.

Ormsby, 20, looked down as McGrath announced the sentence. The Hawthorne resident was convicted last month of first-degree murder for his role in the slaying of Anthony Guest, who was kidnapped and tortured before being burned alive.

Guest’s mother, Lee Anderson, cried as she asked the judge to show no mercy to Ormsby. She said Ormsby should not have any chance for freedom.

“My son certainly won’t have any chance for parole,” Anderson said, giving the judge a photo album of her son.

McGrath, a retired judge who presided over the trial in Ventura County Superior Court, could have ordered Ormsby to prison for life without parole. But McGrath said he decided on the lesser sentence because of the defendant’s youth and lack of a violent criminal past.

According to court testimony, Spencer Brasure and Billy Davis kidnapped 20-year-old Guest of Redondo Beach at gunpoint Sept. 7, 1996, and took him to a house in Lawndale. There, Brasure burned Guest’s face with a torch, stapled wood to his head and broke glass in his mouth, witnesses said.

Ormsby arrived sometime during the torture, witnesses said, and he kicked and hit Guest. Ormsby then helped Brasure and Davis take Guest to a campground near Gorman, where they threw him into the brush, doused him with gasoline and set him on fire while he was still alive.

The victim and assailants apparently knew each other through a loose-knit group of drug users, according to trial testimony.

Both Brasure and Davis were convicted of first-degree murder, kidnapping and other charges. Brasure, 30, was also convicted of torture and was sentenced to death. Davis, 23, received life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Defense attorney Alan Saltzman argued that because the jury determined Ormsby played a lesser role in the crime than the other two men, he deserved a lesser sentence.

“My client, having been found not guilty of torture, should not get the same extreme sentence that those two men got,” he said. “He should be given a slight break.”

Saltzman said his client just showed up at the house and got “sucked into the situation.” Saltzman added that Ormsby lacked maturity and was abused and abandoned as a child.

But Deputy Dist. Atty. Bob Calvert argued that, because of the severity of the crime, Ormsby should receive the maximum sentence.

“[Guest] suffered unbearable pain and was left to die in the middle of nowhere,” he said.

Calvert also said Ormsby has continued to deny responsibility for the crime and has been written up more than 50 times in jail for disrespecting officers and damaging property.

“It’s time now for this court to give the defendant his wake-up call,” he said. “His wake-up call is that society is not going to condone these actions.”

Outside the courtroom, Calvert said he disagreed with the judge’s ruling but understood the reasoning.

“It’s some sort of relief to have this trial completed,” he said. “It’s been a long haul for everybody.”

The judge denied a motion by the defense attorney for a new trial and ordered Ormsby to have drug abuse counseling and pay $10,000 in restitution.